The new site has been a top priority for Mayor Rosalynn Bliss as she took office in 2016.

"Enabling digital self-service on our new website is the centerpiece of our customer service transformation," Interim City Manager Eric DeLong said in a statement. "Our new site provides a digital city hall that is open for business 24/7/365. That means our community can access city services and information on any device, on any browser, at any time, from any place."

The new site quietly went live June 7, 2017, as first city services and then departments were migrated over. Throughout the six months the website was tested by a citizen panel to make tweaks and adjustments.

The website is available in English and Spanish -- and more languages will be added according to resident demand, said Becky Jo Glover, the city's 311 Customer Service Director.

The new website is mobile responsive and works on smartphones, tablets and desktop computers.

The city's grcity.us website had four million page views in 2017, Glover said. She's expecting that figure to decline in 2018 because the new site is more streamlined.

There are now 236 services available to residents through the new website -- 102 of which have never been available online before, including requesting new water service.

Putting the process for requesting or changing water service online has resulted in 79 percent fewer walk-ins to city hall for the service, Glover said, and a three- to 10-day process now takes several hours.

In August the city also launched its new online bill payment portal, GRPayIt, as a part of its website redesign. With a single sign on, residents can pay water, trash, property tax and parking tickets online. The new system has meant 35 percent fewer people are walking in to city hall to pay their bills.

The website isn't completely finished.

There will be additional services added to the mobile site, an enhanced interface for city commission meetings and agendas and additional expansion of GRPayIt.

Additionally, in the next month the city will be adding more data sets to its new portal hosted on the website as a part of its open data initiative.